A Jewish Jesuit in the Eastern Mediterranean Book contents
- A Jewish Jesuit in the Eastern Mediterranean
- A Jewish Jesuit in the Eastern Mediterranean
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- Introduction
- 1 Becoming a Jewish Jesuit: Eliano’s Early Years
- 2 Jesuit Missionary or Jewish Renegade? Eliano’s Confrontation with His Jewish Past
- 3 Jesuit Anti-Judaism and the Fear of Eliano’s Jewishness on the First Mission to the Maronites of Lebanon
- 4 Textual Transmission, Pastoral Ministry, and the Re-Fashioning of Eliano’s Intellectual Training
- 5 Revisiting Eliano’s Jewishness on His Return to Egypt
- 6 The Coptic Mission, Mediterranean Geopolitics, and the Mediation of Eliano’s Jewish and Catholic Identities
- 7 Eliano’s Reconciliation with His Jewishness in His Later Years
- Epilogue
- Bibliography
- Index
3 - Jesuit Anti-Judaism and the Fear of Eliano’s Jewishness on the First Mission to the Maronites of Lebanon
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 27 September 2019
- A Jewish Jesuit in the Eastern Mediterranean
- A Jewish Jesuit in the Eastern Mediterranean
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- Introduction
- 1 Becoming a Jewish Jesuit: Eliano’s Early Years
- 2 Jesuit Missionary or Jewish Renegade? Eliano’s Confrontation with His Jewish Past
- 3 Jesuit Anti-Judaism and the Fear of Eliano’s Jewishness on the First Mission to the Maronites of Lebanon
- 4 Textual Transmission, Pastoral Ministry, and the Re-Fashioning of Eliano’s Intellectual Training
- 5 Revisiting Eliano’s Jewishness on His Return to Egypt
- 6 The Coptic Mission, Mediterranean Geopolitics, and the Mediation of Eliano’s Jewish and Catholic Identities
- 7 Eliano’s Reconciliation with His Jewishness in His Later Years
- Epilogue
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
This chapter begins with a brief sketch of Eliano’s time as preacher and professor of Hebrew and Arabic at the Jesuit college in Rome (1563–77). During this period, however, leading Jesuits moved away from admitting men of Jewish lineage into the Society of Jesus. As the only Jewish-born Jesuit, Eliano found himself on the outs with his superiors, such as when Eliano was not trusted to lead the mission to Lebanon called by Pope Gregory XIII in 1577. Yet, his skills were deemed valuable, so he was relegated to interpreter and translator for the mission’s superior, Tommaso Raggio. However, once the mission began, Raggio's inexperience was evident. In turn, neither Eliano nor the Maronites wished to work with Raggio, and the mission was aborted within months. This chapter ends with Eliano’s return to Rome. Chapter Three illuminates the tension that Jesuit leaders had with Eliano. On one hand, they saw in him a uniquely skilled Jesuit because his Jewish youth trained him for this very work. On the other hand, increased institutional skepticism of Jewish-lineage Jesuits meant that his superiors were unwilling to let him lead, lest his potential crypto-Judaism sabotage the mission.
Keywords
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- A Jewish Jesuit in the Eastern MediterraneanEarly Modern Conversion, Mission, and the Construction of Identity, pp. 90 - 118Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2019